Epilogue

"We did it. We are married." Daphne whispered into his mouth, her gaze intense, however, her smile was soft and enchanting. She pulled away and it took everything in him not to pull her back, getting another taste of those intoxicating lips.

She turned to her family, a wide grin spreading across her lips and she cheered as the pews erupted in applause. Victor did the same — an instinctive mimicry of the gestures but his eyes never left his wife.

His wife. Duchess of Kensington; Daphne Anderson.

He had already been smiling but now he was grinning from ear to ear like a Cheshire cat, a humorous caricature of a smitten man.

He finally had her. The object of his desire for many years. The muse to his yearnings. He finally had something… many things. Love, peace, security, worth, family. She was a whirlwind of fortune, beauty, and grace. She held so much of his will and he only realized it then. In her bridal attire, with the Kensington ducal ring gleaming on her finger.

Before Daphne, he had been an empty man, too scared of the darkness within him, and too embarrassed to admit wanting an idyllic love like the novels described.

With her, he was a grinning peacock.

He wouldn't just be an empty shell anymore. He had a taste of love now; sweet love that turned a man idiotic and he reveled in his idiocy. He wore it like a badge of honor.

She looked at him, eyes anxious, and they began their descent. She led the march as his gaze never left her down the altar. Their families rose, smiles on their faces, applauding as the happy couple walked past them. Daphne's gaze lingered on each member of her family. Harry —Victor's best friend— was snickering but Amelia smacked him. The Earl of Wallace was nodding approvingly, whilst his wife linked arms with his and waved. Melanie was a bundle of unrestrained rhapsody. Victor barely noticed them as he was too enamored with his love, his wife.

He wanted to say something to her because he felt foolish just staring. He wanted to tell her how beautiful she looked. He wanted her to know how lucky he felt. He wanted to thank her for choosing him. But he knew if he had tried to speak at that moment, he would have broken down in fits of hysteria.

As the pews faded to honorary attendees, she squeezed his hand and faced forward, into their future together.

* * *

Daphne felt Victor's warmth beside her and she smiled.

"How did you say it?" she turned to him, her eyes twinkling. "Like stars dotting a moonlit sky."

When Victor wanted to commission a portrait of them, she had thought him ridiculous. It was romantic, it was generous, but that was the problem. People got tired of staring at the freckles on her face in real life; it was generous of him to believe they would want to suffer them any longer, especially when they'd be on display in their home.

She was never insecure about her stars, as he called them.

The portrait, however, was marvelous. Marvelously magnificent. The size was pompous. She hadn't expected such an egregious commission.

When she stood in the entrance hall beside Victor to see their portrait being hung, she gasped.

The woman staring at her couldn't have been her. For one, she was beautiful. No one called her beautiful except her husband. The woman in the portrait would never be called beautiful out of politeness or through the rosy view of love.

The freckles dotting her cheeks were there. Not covered by white paint, not forgotten. Her skin wasn't glossed over. She was illustrated in her natural state, but she looked beautiful. She had the man standing beside her to thank for this.

The portrait captured Victor's cool, intense gaze. And his handsomeness. He was rightfully a duke; he had the air of a nobleman around him. The type of nobility that intimidated men like Percy Farton. He was everyone's object of envy; a duke, a soldier to propriety and protocols; a wealthy aristocrat, nearing royalty.

But the duke wasn't who she had come to love. It was the man himself. She preferred the warmth of the real person. His cheeky smile. Victor Anderson, who didn't act like a duke. She loved that vulgar mouth of his, and the eccentricities of his behavior that would scandalize the ton. She loved the journey that it took to get them both here. She loved the things about him that he didn't realize needed loving.

His back was one. She would spend their marriage kissing his scars and telling him how beautiful he was. On the days he would doubt himself, she would hold his hand and never let go.

She placed her hand on his back, stroking the scars over the fabric of his clothes.

He was the first man not to grit his teeth at the spots on her face. He never chased her out of the ballroom with derision to her person; he loved her earnestly. "The poets do not compare to the eloquence of my husband." She teased him, but she ended up feeling the weight of her words more than he. Her husband. Her heart fluttered.

"You flatter me, my wife." They felt the solemnity of her words equally. As equals. They were equals now. Man and woman. Wife and husband. They had found love and had chosen to protect it together.

"I believe you should write a book."

Victor quirked a brow, amused as she continued. Her teasing smile wrinkled her lips and her eyes shone with mischief.

After they had wed, she demanded to be allowed all the teasing she could for the entirety of the marriage. It was only fair, considering he had been such a nerve-racking presence before the inception of their courtship.

"It would be a very lucrative business for the dukedom. If our estates were to go bankrupt you would save us with literature," she continued. Victor nodded attentively as if ready to summon his solicitors. "Wouldn't you want to go down in history as an aristocratic Shakespeare?"

"A few weeks ago, I would have said yes. I would have also challenged anyone that brought up my prolificacy in literature to a duel." She realized he admitted tacitly to having relations with poetry writing and her brows furrowed.

"Are you actually a poet?"

He nodded.

"Poetry?" She laughed.

"You are the muse to all my pieces."

"Are you serious?"

Who was this man? Victor could charm with his words but only because he was a well-practiced rake. Flirting came naturally to him, as did highborn language. He would not hide a second personality or at least a benign interest. She knew everything there was to know about him, and a feat such as flowery compositions was not something she felt she would have no knowledge about.

"A drunk man sings the most beautiful ballads. And I was intoxicated with you from the very first taste of your lips," He took her hands in his and smiled. His smile was boyish and timid, unlike his usual confident self.

He wrote about her. "You have never told me this."

Her father had called love a silly game of flowers and poetry. And he had been right. She was being told by a grinning husband about the poetry he had written in her honor. He wrote about her. Not many women received stanzas but she just so happened to be among the few. Perhaps someone would consider that silly, but Daphne never would.

"I spent those four years yearning for you." He cupped her cheeks and rested his forehead on hers. "I did not want to give myself hope. I did not want to give us hope. I thought if I could make love to you on the pages, I would be satisfied. But your magnificence burns both ink and paper."

"You love me." Her eyes watered as she came to the realization. It wasn't just a proclamation anymore, it was a bundle of actions. He loved her by being by her side, he loved her by marrying her, he loved her by yearning after her, he loved her by portraying her in such a manner that transcended divinity, and he would keep on loving her.

From the look in his eyes, it was obvious. From the professions of his vows, it was clear how. He would protect her always; he would go to great lengths to make her heart flutter. He would be by her side and she would be by his.

He loved her and he would always love her.

"I really do. With everything in me."

But the Earl of Wallace had been wrong that day about one thing, Love wasn't a fantasy to her. It was her reality.

They moved from the foyer to Victor's bedroom, unable to contain themselves any longer.

Daphne pressed his warmth into her. She could feel every inch of his body, every action of his. It was the first time they had gone that far. The first time they had crossed the line. Even if they hadn't been married, she would have given herself to him in that manner, at that moment.

She wanted to feel all of him, wanted to have him panting in her ear as his body slithered over hers. She longed to feel his breath hot against her skin, his touch sending shivers of pleasure coursing through her veins. She wanted to lose herself in him, to become one with him in body and soul.

His taut muscle merged with her soft skin. His hands groped her body hungrily. He worshipped every crevice of her person. He touched and flicked every pleasure point. She should have been overwhelmed, but adrenaline suffused her.

Her hands worshipped his body — his full nudity — as if she had done so multiple times. She kissed and teased. Grinded her nails into his back when their passion rolled her eyes into the back of her head. She would give him new scars. Mark him with the proof of her love. So when he'd look at his back, he would remember their wedding night. The moment she gave her entirety to him. The moment they become one body.

She planted a kiss on his forehead and they laughed together in their intimate moment. Then she whimpered and he laughed, reveling in how eager he had made her.

He lowered his head between her legs again and ran his tongue over her wet flesh.

"God, Daphne. You taste like nectar from a honeycomb. I can't believe you're mine," he breathed before he continued feasting on her.

After he threw her over the edge of pure bliss again, he climbed up and placed himself inside her.

Daphne gasped and he quickly lowered himself down to capture her lips with his, his lips moving in unison with his hips.

His body convulsed in hers as he met his ecstasy and hers convulsed around him as she met hers. They pulled away, breathless, but still filled with lust and love for each other. They couldn't be bothered to separate. She didn't care to untwine her hand from his hair neither did he care to pull his limpness from between her legs. They stayed panting, Victor on top of her sweaty skin.

Daphne pulled her head back with an insurmountable urge to say, "I love you."

Staring into her love-filled eyes, his throat hoarse, he didn't hesitate to reply, "I love you too." Then he pressed his lips on hers.

Daphne smiled as she remembered that their story started with a kiss.

And it would continue like that, with many, many other kisses to come.

The End?